We recently moved my Grandmother in with us. I have 2 children, ages 13 and 15. They have already given up quite a bit of freedom, on days that I work they have Grandma duty when they get home from school. We have a caregiver that comes until noon, so she takes care of her shower, breakfast and lunch, so the kids are mostly keeping her company, warming up her coffee, giving her an arm to lean on to get from here to there and reassuring her when she asks every 3- 5 minutes that her cat has been fed. I don't make them help her with her bathroom issues (she wears a depend and I clean up any mess when I get home), I just need them to be here with her. If they want to have friends over they can, they just have to promise to check on grandma and not ignore her. They both get frustrated though, it does get old answering the same questions over and over and over again. They usually at some point ditch her for a while and decompress in their rooms. But they do check on her. It's just that when she is alone for any length of time she gets all depressed and moody and starts in with the "Nobody wants me here, I should just go to a home". Is it appropriate that I leave her with them? Is this asking too much? I don't think it's fair for them to have to sit and watch TV with her all afternoon, so I don't make them. I also don't want them to resent her, or me! Not sure what to do, I am new to all of this.
Good luck!
Have an honest talk with your kids - and lavish them with praise for what they do and how much it helps you. Keep doors of communication wide open so they feel comfortable and safe to decompress with you as needed.
Regarding your Mom, how about having small things like a photo album for her to peruse. Can she call friends?
Maybe your daughters could create a little "calendar" that says "Today is Monday, June 3" and "Suzie has been fed - YAAAY!" They can fill it in with Grandma every day when they get home from school and keep it where they can point to it when Grandma asks. With enough repetition, she'll look there first (hopefully).
Even with my mom, the constant repetition of questions every few minutes can drive me up the WALL! I tell her to write stuff down and then when she asks the same thing two minutes later, I hand her what she just wrote. I can laugh right now about it, but some days it's extremely frustrating!
Your daughters sound like they're doing OK and Grandma is too. It's tough to put everyone together without a few issues here and there. Good luck with it!
When I married 40 years ago we blended our families and had 2 teenage girls and 2 preschool boys. Our babysitting policy was always to ask the girls if they wanted the job. If they didn't we got a sitter. We paid whoever sat the same -- family or other teen. We did not pay the teens for everything they did -- they had chores and responsibilities around the house. But we thought it was hard enough for them to adjust to such a drastic change in family dynamics and the makeup of the household that we wanted to reduce and possible causes for resentment that we could. I'm happy to say the the step-siblings all like each other!
I think that what you are having your teens do is Gramma sitting. Personally, I think that they should be paid and it should either be limited (for example, to one day a week) or it should be optional. You should have someone else available to do this, too. The funds should ideally come from Gramma's income or assets.